OLIVER: We usually start with your name and how old you are.

HENRY: Why?

OLIVER: I don't know, I guess...so people know your name and how old you are.

HENRY: Ok.  My name is Henry, and I'm 2 years old, 5 in Earth years.

OLIVER: What did your parents do?

HENRY: They cleaned the hallways and Common Areas in all of the residential buildings, and some of the other buildings, too.

OLIVER: Oh, so they actually probably saw more of the Colony than almost anyone else, huh?

HENRY: Yeah, maybe except your dad.

OLIVER: Did you ever see them at work?

HENRY: Yeah, they would mostly take me with them, usually.  What about you?

OLIVER: Me?  Uh, no, I never really saw my dad at work.  Maybe sometimes when he brought it home with him, I guess.  Did you notice anything about how they did their job?

HENRY: They mostly stopped arguing.

OLIVER: Oh, they did?  I guess it was too much work to argue?

HENRY: No, their work wasn't that hard.  The robots will do most of the cleaning, you just need to set them up.  They showed me how, a few times.  You need to empty the dirty water compartment and fill up the clean water one, and select the right programs from the menu for that building, and stuff like that, but it wasn't so hard.  But they just sort of concentrated on work, while they were doing it.  Other times, they would argue a lot, sometimes.  I think they weren't really mad, they just argued out of habit.

OLIVER: What about?

HENRY: Kind of everything.  What to eat, what to buy, what to do on their next day off, which show to watch.  They would just always argue.  If they weren't arguing, it meant either they were working or sleeping, or else one of them was sick.  Whenever new people showed up from Earth, they would stop arguing for a little while because one or the other of them would be sick.  But if they were both healthy and awake and not working, they would argue.

OLIVER: That sounds stressful.

HENRY: I was just used to it.  They weren't really mad, that's just how they talked.  To each other, anyway.  They didn't talk to me that way.

OLIVER: Oh, well that's good at least.

HENRY: I guess not everyone's parents were like that.

OLIVER: No, but who knows, maybe it's more common than I realize.  I guess at least your parents were talking a lot.

HENRY: Oh yeah.  Even when a show was on and we were all watching it together, they would talk over it all the time, to each other.  I kind of wished they were able to be quiet, when it was one of my favorite shows, but that's not what they were like.  Did your parents do that?

OLIVER: Talk over shows?  No, no, not too much.  They didn't really talk all that much, I guess.

...

HENRY: Are you ok?

OLIVER: What?  Yes, yeah I'm fine.  Is there anything you would like to ask Earth?

HENRY: Uh, hmmm, about what?

OLIVER: I guess, anything.  Anything Earth might be able to tell us about.

HENRY: Hmm...are they going to send us new parents?

OLIVER: What?

HENRY: Now that we don't have any parents, anymore.  When we run out of other stuff, sometimes they send more from Earth.  It would be nice if they could send us, maybe, new parents.  I mean, I'd rather have my real parents back, but I guess they can't do that because of the Electrocution, but I wonder if they could send us new parents?

OLIVER: Oh...well, I'll think about that.  I guess I'll have to figure out how to ask that.

HENRY: Ok.  Are you ok?

OLIVER: Yeah, yeah I'm fine, actually.  We're going to be fine, Henry, ok?  Whether they can send us new parents or not, we're going to make it.

HENRY: Cool.  But maybe ask them, just in case.